Patching Each Other Up Part 2
by itsgonnabemay5
Summary: Keith and Lance deal with their injuries until Coran and the gang rescue them.


**Part 2:**

A string of curses woke Keith up from a light sleep.

"Quiznack!" he heard as his eyes popped wide open. He blinked and his eyes were greeted by a shirtless Lance, murmuring about something about bandages.

Keith blinked the sleep from his eyes until they focused. Since when was Lance on the other side of the room and not in his arms? "Lance? What's wrong?"

Lance hissed in pain again and cursed. It appeared to Keith that he was trying to bandage his ribs himself. "I'm just trying to—" Lance said as he tried wrapping the bandage around his torso, "—but it's not working and it really-ahh-really hurts." He grimaced and so did Keith.

He had tried sleeping next to Keith, but after the pain medicine wore off, the pain in his ribs had him up the last several hours. When he couldn't take it anymore, he resorted to the first aid kit to see what he could do to alleviate some of the pain.

"Okay, hang on. I'm coming." Keith began to scoot his body towards Lance, failing in his attempt at stifling a yelp as he felt all his injuries come alive again.

"I'm sorry for waking you up," Lance said.

"I wish you would've woken me up sooner," Keith replied. His wrist was throbbing and so was his ankle. When he reached him, he took the bandage from his hands. Studying Lance's torso, he noticed that his ribs were actually more swollen than before, but he resisted the urge to touch them, knowing it would hurt Lance further.

"Okay, let's start from down here, I guess." Keith placed the end of the bandage around Lance's torso, starting just above his belly button. Then he wound it tightly around his lower ribs. Lance's skin felt a bit hot under his hands. "Lance, do you feel alright? You seem a little warm."

"I feel kinda sick," Lance admitted. "And chilled."

Keith put his palm flat against Lance's torso and then felt along his chest and neck. "I think you might have a fever."

There was nothing he could do for him now. There was no other medication in the emergency kit. Keith could only guess that the fever came from either an infection in his leg or from the trauma of last night. It was no use panicking, so he continued his focus on wrapping Lance's chest.

When Lance gave a small squeal of pain, Keith loosened it a bit and kept going. "You doing okay?" Keith asked, wrapping the bandage around his back and over again, getting closer to the worst area. Lance nodded, so he kept wrapping. When the bandage touched Lance's broken ribs and was wound tightly around the area, Lance whimpered and shut his eyes as Keith whispered that he was sorry.

When it was over, Lance looked a bit better. He sat up a little taller and actually smiled. It was a small smile, but it was a smile nonetheless.

"Thanks," Lance said. "I feel like I can breathe again."

Keith smiled.

"How are _your_ ribs, by the way?" Lance asked.

"Still pretty sore," Keith said, his hand automatically moving to his side. Anything but small movements hurt them, so he had to be careful how he twisted his body.

Lance frowned. "I'd wrap them for you," he said, rummaging through the first aid kit. "But I think I took the last bandage. I'm sorry."

"No, Lance. It's okay. I'm just glad we had one for you. You think that'll hold you for a while, at least until Coran finds us?"

Speaking about Coran, the silence in the ship was interrupted by a voice calling out to them on the radio.

"Hello? Lance, Keith? If you copy, say something."

Keith and Lance looked at each other in surprise. Keith, moving quickly, scooted his body towards the radio. Ignoring the pulls and tugs on his injuries, he got onto his one foot and hit the button. "Hunk, this is Keith. We copy! Where are you guys?"

Hunk gave his coordinates and said it could still take a while because they were still far away, but Coran was able to finally locate them, with the help of Pidge.

"Are you guys doing okay?" Hunk asked.

"Well, not really. We both got attacked on the planet we landed on. We're both in pretty bad shape. We're going to both need pods as soon as we can. Lance is really bad off."

"Uh, about that," Hunk said, and Keith could hear the hesitation in his voice.

"Don't tell me you don't have any pods, Hunk," Lance said, obviously agitated.

"Well, I really want to tell you that, but um, you see. . .the pods are down. When we crash landed, they malfunctioned. Coran hasn't had any time to devote to it since we've been using all our energy on finding you."

Lance sighed. Well, at least he had a good reason.

"It's okay, Hunk. Just get here as fast as you can, will you?" Keith said.

"We will. Just hold tight. Shouldn't be more than a day." And with that, Hunk signed off.

The boys were excited that their friends had finally located them. Now they just had to sit around and wait. Keith crawled over to sit next to Lance, holding his ribs and groaning as he lowered himself down.

"Easy there. You okay?" Lance asked, seeing the pained look in Keith's eyes.

"Never better," Keith said. Then he drew up his foot and started unwrapping the bandage around his ankle.

Lance looked over. "Ooh, it's gotten worse. Ouch."

Keith's ankle had swollen a lot just overnight. "Yep. Exactly. Coran had better get those pods up and running fast."

The following morning was all they had to wait until they were rescued. The gang couldn't believe how badly off they were, and they mentally added medical supplies to their list of things to stock up on for the future.

Hunk helped Lance on his feet and guided him to the castle. Shiro, judging from Keith's favoring of one leg, lifted him into his arms and carried him into the ship.

They brought them to the ship's infirmary and allowed Coran to do the rest. The two boys were laying on their backs on their own separate cots. After asking each of them their list of bodily complaints, he used his handy mobile scanner, which was long and wide, the width of a piece of paper. He started with Lance first.

He held the scanner several inches above Lance's head first, and inch by inch, hovered the machine over Lance's body, focusing on the spots that Lance said pained him. It reacted much like a metal detector. When it detected nothing to be out of the ordinary, it lightly beeped. However, when it detected something to be wrong, such as broken bones or sprains, it beeped louder and faster.

When Coran hovered it over Lance's chest, the machine went wild. Coran held it over his torso for a good minute, studying the x-ray the scanner displayed on the screen. Coran made a few mental notes before moving on. The rest of his body was silent until he got to his bandaged leg. He held it over the bloodstained bandage and once again, the machine went crazy.

"Hmm. . . I see," Coran said after a while.

"What's wrong with him?" Pidge asked.

"Is it serious?" Hunk asked Coran.

"Well," Coran said. "Lance has two broken ribs, multiple bruised ones, and his leg seems to be infected. I've got some antibiotics for him, but his leg will have to be stitched up. Also, Lance, you aren't allowed to do anything more than to rest and stay off your feet. Any other kind of activity puts you at risk for a pneumothorax."

"A numo-what?" Hunk asked.

"A pneumothorax. It's when the ribs puncture a lung and makes it collapse. If any of his ribs get bumped around, he's likely to injure other organs as well. It's best to stay on bed rest for several days at least." Coran was about to move on to Keith until he noticed something else on the readings. "Looks like you have a small fever, too. Pidge, mind getting him a blanket?"

"Sure," Pidge said. She grabbed one from the drawer and covered Lance's body with it.

Coran moved on to Keith and let the scanner read his injuries. "Several bruised ribs as well. . . sprained wrist it looks like. . . Hmm, yes. Looks like a fractured ankle, I'm afraid. Looks like both of you are going to be spending a week together healing."

Coran began opening drawers and gathering medical supplies, talking to Princess Allura. Keith couldn't make out what he was saying, but they were headed over to Lance's bedside. "This shouldn't take too long." He handed some gauze and some kind of thread to Allura and then began unwrapping Lance's bandage from his leg.

"Oh, yes, it is a bit deep," he said, and the princess scowled at the bloody sight of it.

"Are you sure you want me helping with this?" she asked.

"You're as good as any of them," Coran said. He injected a numbing agent near the area.

Keith, realizing they were about so sew Lance up, began to rise into a sitting position. He grunted, but managed to get onto his feet. Pidge, upon seeing what Keith was doing, immediately rushed towards him.

"Keith, what are you doing? Let me help you!" Pidge said, and she put one arm around his waist. "You can't be walking on a broken ankle!"

"I just wanna be with Lance while he gets this done," Keith said. Hunk joined Keith's other side, and between the two of them, managed to get Keith safely to Lance's side, where they slipped him a chair to sit in.

"Just hold still," Coran told Lance. Lance stole a glance at Keith, who was looking at him worriedly. Coran began stitching him up, which created a lot of blood, and it began oozing from Lance's now puss-filled wound.

Lance didn't feel the pain, only the strange tugs from the needle and thread. Hunk began gagging and coughing, and promptly threw up on the floor at his feet. At the sudden loss of contact from Hunk, Keith leaned his weight against Pidge as she steadied him.

"Oh!" Allura cried once she turned to see Hunk hovering over the floor, one hand wiping his mouth from the vomit. "Hunk, are you alright?"

"Just a little queasy. Sorry." He excused himself and headed to the bathroom.

"Poor guy," Keith said.

After a while, when all wounds and injuries had been wrapped and cared for, Lance and Keith were finally alone together again. They were still in the infirmary, sitting up in their separate beds, which had been pushed side by side so they could be close and hold hands, as they were doing now.

"How do you feel?" Keith asked him, tracing circles on the back of Lance's hand.

Lance was still feverish, so he hogged most of the blankets. "I'm okay. A bit tired, but okay."

"Good. Me, too." The boys had been fed some pain meds, so their injuries weren't hurting them as much as before.

"I feel bad for making Hunk lose his lunch, though," Lance said.

Keith laughed. "Typical Hunk. Don't worry. I think he's used to it by now."

Lance smiled. "I'm so glad that you're okay. That _we're_ okay." He gave Keith's hand a tight squeeze and lay his head on Keith's shoulder.

Keith leaned into the touch. "Me, too."

After a long silence and Keith's eyelids began to droop, Lance said, "Night, love."

"'Night, sweetie," Keith replied, and he let the lull of sleep take him in.


End file.
